Built in 1858 at the Port and Harbour Master's yard in Williamstown Victoria, the Portland Lifeboat was overseen by Harbour Master Charles Ferguson. It is understood to have been constructed from the same moulds used to build the Port Fairy Lifeboat, designed by William White, in 1857. Both boats are similar to the lifeboats designed in England by James Peake and adopted by the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) in the UK. The Portland Lifeboat's 9.14 m (30 ft) long hull is double diagonally planked in New Zealand kauri, and many of the planks run from gunwale to gunwale in one piece under the inner keel section. Eucalyptus and oregon were used elsewhere and the local blacksmith made the iron work. The fastenings are copper. There are two flotation or buoyancy tanks at either end, with prominent whaleback style decking. Under the thwarts is a deck with scuppers so that the craft is both buoyant and self draining whenever large waves are taken aboard in rough conditions. The lifeboat was oar-powered with a sailing rig. The original rig was a lug mainsail, but this was replaced with a lug and headsail rig taken from a fishing boat in 1903. The lifeboat was manned by volunteer crews, mostly local fishermen from Portland. They maintained this service until 1915 when the boat was replaced with a new motorised craft. The lifeboat's most outstanding service was to the steamer ADMELLA in 1859 when the ship grounded on a reef off Cape Banks in South Australia, 150 km to the west of Portland. Survivors clung to the rigging in heavy seas for over a week and 89 people lost their lives in the shipwreck. Taken to the scene by the steamer LADY BIRD, the Portland Lifeboat was unable to assist until eight days after the ADMELLA's grounding when the seas abated enough for the lifeboat to manoeuvre close to the ship and rescue the last 19 survivors. Since its retirement in 1915 the lifeboat has been a memorial to those who manned it and those it rescued. For a long period it was on display in the Portland Gardens, first in the open and then under a canopy. In 2008 it was on display inside the Portland Maritime Discovery Centre, still in original condition complete with the rig from 1915. It is one of the oldest vessels of its type in Australia, and the world.Portland LifeboatPhotograph showing the Portland Lifeboatphotography, portland lifeboat, admella

Ex - Portland Free Library Museum and Literary Institute, purchased 1/6/1917.Dark green cloth-covered board covers and spine. Black text and graphics on front cover. 16 photogravure plates.Front: Portland Free Library Museum and Literary Institute....purchased 1.6.17 (inside front cover, label) Back: (no inscriptions)

Maroon cloth binding over carboard covers, with title and author in gold on spine and cover, within framing design. Repairs made to spine with green thread stiching visible on both edges of spine.Front: W.S. Malseed (black ink, front page verso) (numbers in pencil on same page) Back: (no inscriptions)

Donated to the Portland Free Library by Sir Edwin Durning-Lawrence in October 1910.Red cloth-covered cardboard covers and spine. Gold text on front cover and spine. Portland Free Library label on inside cover.Front: Label inside front cover. 'Presented to the Committee of the Portland Free Library by Sir E. Durning-Lawrence - October 1910...'

From an ABC article about and exhibition containing the letter from Patience Whitmore: The hardships and tragedies often faced by new arrivals are also detailed in this exhibition, especially in a letter written by Patience Whitmore who arrived in 1853... Widowed before she left Britain, she made the trip to Australia with her second husband and children, although two of those children and her second husband died on the way out. She married for a third time after arriving, and that husband also passed away fairly early on, with Patience following not long after. The remaining children were sent off to an orphanage. Even though that sounds like a terrible life, apparently, compared with the life she might've had back in Britain, Patience considered herself to be very lucky, which gives you some insight into what life in Britain must've been like at the time.Letter written by Patience Whitmore in 1853.emigration, 1853, patience whitmore, letter